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Prince Bandar is the child of Prince Sultan and one of his servants, but under Sharia, the Islamic law that governs Saudi Arabia, all sons are considered born equal and are to be afforded similar status. Though Bandar spent his early years living apart from his father, when he was eleven he and his mother were both invited to live with the royal family. At the time, the young prince was not considered one of the most promising Saud sons, but his grandmother saw that the boy was sharp and determined to create his own opportunities. Later, as a young man, he also won the attention of his uncle, King Fahd.

After pursuing a career as a fighter pilot, Prince Bandar turned to public policy, studying at Johns Hopkins University. In 1983, King Fahd appointed him ambassador to the United States. Bandar soon became known on Capitol Hill for his flashy style, and more importantly, his smooth political dealings as a Washington insider. In early 2001, Prince Bandar helped broker President Clinton’s failed eleventh hour plan for peace in the Middle East. Today, Bandar is known to have close personal and political ties with President Bush, and he purportedly enjoys easy access to the Oval Office. However, the ambassador’s intimate relations with the current administration have proven controversial on more than one occasion: In April, 2004 it was reported that Bandar assured President Bush that he would work to keep oil prices low leading up to the presidential election in November.

On June 1, 2004, Prince Bandar printed an extraordinary statement in AL-WATAN, a Saudi newspaper partly owned by Prince Bandar bin Khalid. The editorial accused the kingdom of seeking to blame its problems with terrorism on foreign influences while failing to look at the domestic causes of violence, and urged clerics to support a “jihad” against terrorist campaigns. Such critical views and candor are rarely glimpsed inside the tightly controlled Saudi press.

Prince Bandar (pictures of his wife and Osama Basnan are not available). [Source: Publicity photo]

Princess Haifa bint Faisal, the wife of Prince Bandar, the Saudi ambassador to the US, begins sending monthly cashier’s checks of between $2,000 and $3,500 (accounts differ) to Majeda Dweikat, the Jordanian wife of Osama Basnan, a Saudi living in San Diego. Accounts also differ over when the checks were first sent (between November 1999 and about March 2000; a Saudi government representative has stated December 4, 1999 [Fox News, 11/23/2002] ).

Basnan’s wife signs many of the checks over to her friend Manal Bajadr, the wife of Omar al-Bayoumi. The payments are made through Riggs Bank, a bank which appears to have turned a blind eye to Saudi embassy transaction and also has longstanding ties to covert CIA operations (see July 2003). [Newsweek, 11/22/2002; Newsweek, 11/24/2002; Guardian, 11/25/2002; Washington Times, 11/26/2002] Some later suggest that the money from the wife of the Saudi ambassador passes through the al-Bayoumi and Basnan families as intermediaries and ends up in the hands of the two hijackers.

The payments from Princess Haifa continue until May 2002 and may total $51,000, or as much as $73,000. [Newsweek, 11/22/2002; MSNBC, 11/27/2002] While living in the San Diego area, al-Bayoumi and Basnan are heavily involved in helping with the relocation of, and offering financial support to, Saudi immigrants in the community. [Los Angeles Times, 11/24/2002] In late 2002, al-Bayoumi claims he did not pass any money along to the hijackers. [Washington Times, 12/4/2002] Basnan has variously claimed to know al-Bayoumi, not to know him at all, or to know him only vaguely. [ABC News, 11/25/2002; Arab News, 11/26/2002; ABC News, 11/26/2002; MSNBC, 11/27/2002]

However, earlier reports say Basnan and his wife were “very good friends” of al-Bayoumi and his wife. Both couples lived at the Parkwood Apartments at the same time as the two hijackers; prior to that, the couples lived together in a different apartment complex. In addition, the two wives were arrested together in April 2001 for shoplifting. [San Diego Union-Tribune, 10/22/2002] Entity Tags: Majeda Dweikat, Manal Bajadr, Haifa bint Faisal, Osama Basnan, Omar al-Bayoumi

During a meeting with President Bush, Saudi Prince Bandar expresses concern about the US’s continuing patrolling of the “no-fly zone” in Iraq. The prince complains that it is “costing us militarily, financially, but much more importantly politically,” and adds that “it is not hurting Saddam Hussein.” Bush seems to agree. “If there is any military action, then it has to be decisive. That can finalize the issue,” Bush says. “The Iraqi opposition is useless and not effective.” [Risen, 2006, pp. 183-184]

In 1973, the price of oil skyrockets, bringing a huge amount of wealth to Saudi Arabia and other oil-rich Middle Eastern countries. The Center for Security Policy (CSP), a Washington think tank, will calculate in 2003 that, between 1975 and 2002, the Saudi government spends over $70 billion on international aid. More than two thirds of the money goes to Islamic related purposes such as building mosques and religious schools. This money usually supports Wahhabism, a fundamentalist version of Islam dominant in Saudi Arabia but far less popular in most other Islamic nations.

CSP scholar Alex Alexiev calls this “the largest worldwide propaganda campaign ever mounted” in the history of the world. In addition, private Saudi citizens donate many billions more for Wahhabi projects overseas through private charities. Some of the biggest charities, such as the Muslim World League and its affiliate, the International Islamic Relief Organization (IIRO), are headed by Saudi government officials and closely tied to the government.

The IIRO takes credit for funding 575 new mosques in Indonesia alone. Most of this money is spent on benign purposes with charitable intentions. But US News and World Report will assert in 2003: “Accompanying the money, invariably, was a blizzard of Wahhabist literature.… Critics argue that Wahhabism’s more extreme preachings—mistrust of infidels, branding of rival sects as apostates, and emphasis on violent jihad—laid the groundwork for terrorist groups around the world.” [US News and World Report, 12/7/2003; US News and World Report, 12/15/2003]

* President says Pakistan not inherently prone to terrorism or extremism * Blames 1979 US mission in Afghanistan for militancy in region

BRUSSELS: President General Pervez Musharraf has blamed the West for breeding terrorism in his country by bringing in thousands of mujahideen to fight the Soviet Union in Afghanistan and then leaving Pakistan alone a decade later to face the armed warriors.

Musharraf told the European Parliament’s foreign affairs committee on Tuesday that Pakistan was not the intolerant, extremist country often portrayed by the West, and terrorism and extremism were not inherent in Pakistani society. “Whatever extremism or terrorism is in Pakistan is a direct fallout of the 26 years of warfare and militancy around us. It gets back to 1979 when the West, the United States and Pakistan waged a war against the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan,” Musharraf told EU lawmakers.

“We launched a jihad, brought in mujahideen from all over the Muslim world, the US and the West…We armed the Taliban and sent them in; we did it together. In 1989 everyone left Pakistan with 30,000 armed mujahideen who were there, and the Taliban who were there,” he said, adding that Pakistan had “paid a big price for being part of the coalition that fought the Soviet Union.”

Musharraf said that the scourge of terrorism had been eliminated from Pakistan and that efforts were underway to root out extremism, but this would take time.

Musharraf also urged Pakistani expatriates to invest in Pakistan and to send maximum foreign exchange to boost the country’s economy. The president stressed that they play a role in enhancing the dignity and prestige of the country. He said that Pakistan and Belgium had strong economic ties, which needed further expansion.

He added that Pakistanis living in Belgium should further the country’s development. Musharraf also stressed on the need for the Pakistani community to impart modern education to their children. He informed the Pakistani community about the steps taken by government to boost the country’s economy, to provide basic facilities and to counter regional instability.

Gen Musharraf met with Belgian Prime Minister Guy Verhofstadt later on Tuesday to discuss trade ties between their countries, and the situation in Afghanistan and Lebanon.

Mr Verhofstadt told reporters that Gen Musharraf had urged the EU to play a bigger role in finding a solution to the Middle East crisis.

New Delhi: Top commanders of the Pakistan military establishment knew in advance about the Al Qaeda's plans to attack the United States in September 2001, claims a former senior Indian Government official.

B.Raman, a former Additional Secretary in the Cabinet Secretariat, claims that there are at least 220 references on Pakistan's involvement with Jihadi terrorists, including those associated with the Al Qaeda, in a report prepared by a U.S. National Commission which enquired into the 9/11 terrorist strikes across the United States.

The 9/11 Commission's report, though comprehensive, has two important omissions. First, it has failed to go into the circumstances surrounding the kidnapping and brutal murder American journalist Daniel Pearl in Karachi in 2002. An in-depth enquiry into this murder was necessary in order to establish the pre-9/11 links of some of the Pakistani Generals with Al Qaeda and the Taliban and their frantic post-9/11 attempts to cover them up. It is the fear that these links might be exposed by Pearl's enquiries, which led to his kidnapping and murder.

The second relates to an assessment prepared by some members of the research staff of the commission on the events preceding 9/11 after scrutinising the records of the intelligence agencies, including the interrogation report of Khalid Sheikh Mohammad, a Pakistani, who orchestrated the 9/11 terrorist strikes on behalf of Osama bin Laden from his (Khalid's) hide-out in Karachi.

Coupled with this revelation is another startling report that claims that the Pakistan Embassy in Washington paid out huge bribes to the National Commission through its American lobbyists. The bribes were allegedly paid to fudge the report and exclude some findings damaging to Pakistan.

The Friday Times, a prestigious weekly of Lahore, which carried the intriguing report, said it is based on a testimony given by a Pakistan Foreign Service officer to the Public Accounts Committee of the Pakistan National Assembly. The diplomat has been identified as Sadiq.

In spite of these references, Raman say that the National Commission has recommended long-term engagement with Pakistan in order to win the so-called war against terrorism.

"Foreign Secretary Riaz Mohammad Khan and Special Secretary Sher Afghan were present at the meeting when an FO (Foreign Office) official, Sadiq, who was part of the secret negotiations with members of the US inquiry team and has just returned from Washington after completing a three-year tenure at the Pakistan Embassy, revealed that a lot of money had been spent to silence the members of the Inquiry Commission and induce them to go soft on Pakistan," says the Friday Times.

According to Sadiq, "dramatic changes were made in the final draft of the Inquiry Commission report after Pakistani lobbyists arranged meetings with members of the commission and convinced them to remove anti-Pakistan findings."

“On or around” this day, the Mossad give their “latest” warning to the US of a major, imminent attack by al-Qaeda, according to sources close to Mossad. One former Mossad agent says, “My understanding is that the warning was not specific. No target was identified. But it should have resulted in an increased state of security.” US intelligence claims this never happened. [Sunday Mail, 9/16/2001]

According to German newspapers, the Mossad gives the CIA a list of 19 terrorists living in the US and say that they appear to be planning to carry out an attack in the near future. It is unknown if these are the 19 9/11 hijackers or if the number is a coincidence. However, four names on the list are known, and these four will be 9/11 hijackers: Nawaf Alhazmi, Khalid Almihdhar, Marwan Alshehhi, and Mohamed Atta. [Die Zeit (Hamburg), 10/1/2002; Der Spiegel (Hamburg), 10/1/2002; BBC, 10/2/2002; Ha'aretz, 10/3/2002] The Mossad appears to have learned about this through its “art student spy ring.” Yet apparently, this warning and list are not treated as particularly urgent by the CIA and the information is not passed on to the FBI. It is unclear whether this warning influenced the decision to add Alhazmi and Almihdhar to a terrorism watch list on this same day, and if so, why only those two. [Der Spiegel (Hamburg), 10/1/2002] Israel has denied that there were any Mossad agents in the US. [Ha'aretz, 10/3/2002]

At some point between these dates, Israel warns the US that an al-Qaeda attack is imminent. [Fox News, 5/17/2002] Reportedly, two high-ranking agents from the Mossad come to Washington and warn the FBI and CIA that from 50 to 200 terrorists have slipped into the US and are planning “a major assault on the United States.” They say indications point to a “large scale target,” and that Americans would be “very vulnerable.” They add there could be Iraqi connections to the al-Qaeda attack. [Daily Telegraph, 9/16/2001; Ottawa Citizen, 9/17/2001; Los Angeles Times, 9/20/2001] The Los Angeles Times later retracts its story after a CIA spokesperson says, “There was no such warning. Allegations that there was are complete and utter nonsense.” [Los Angeles Times, 9/21/2001] Other newspapers do not retract it.